FL RAID heals: Disc or Holy?

[Snowy Vixen]

Hey all, I'm currently Disc but is Holy better for raid heals?

Any input would be greatly appreciated!

[FieryBull]

In 25-man with the sanctuary bug, yes. Otherwise, no.

[lizon]

Hey all, I'm currently Disc but is Holy better for raid heals?

Any input would be greatly appreciated!

Depends on it's you are raiding 10m or 25m and what other healers you have. I'm disc in 10m using a holy pally, disc priest, restro shammy setup. When we 2 heal it's just me and the pally, still disc spec.

[Ellumina]

Both are perfectly viable raid healing specs. Disc has a great raid CD that Holy lacks though, and it's not like Disc is particularly gimped in AoE healing. When it comes down to it, play what you enjoy / prefer.

[Kurzior]

It depends what comp you're running with, but generally:

Raid/Aoe healing - Holy > Atonement Disc > Non-atonement disc
Tank healing - non-atonement disc > holy > atonement disc

If you go atonement spec, you will be depending a lot on smite's smart heal through atonement
otherwise, penance and heal/greater heal become primary spam heals
PW:S is you heavy weapon in either case

Holy depends a lot on a few things. The first is people being intelligent about clicking your lightwell and doing so at good times, otherwise it will be wasted on overhealing or just sit there useless. However, you have more flexibility during fights through chakra to adapt to what is happening.

Neither one is so powerful that the other is not considered viable. As long as you know what you're doing, both are valid and powerful raid specs depending on what comp you run with. The only real complaint about holy is its lack of a consistent raid cooldown that other healers bring. Hymn is great, but the cd is too long to get regular use in most fights.

[hikamiro]

In 25-man with the sanctuary bug, yes. Otherwise, no.

sanctuary bug?

[Danner]

For 10mans: disc
For all heroic modes: disc
For 25mans assuming you have at least 2 druid healers: disc
For fights where mana is tight: disc
For fights needing a cooldown: disc
For single target healing fights: disc

Everywhere else, you can go with whatever you want. But disc is generally the better choice.
Holy is great if you overgear the content though.

--

The sanctuary bug is a bug that was introduced in patch 4.2. When casting the Sanctuary spell, it is supposed to heal up to 6 targets, and suffering diminishing returns for any target beyond that. Meaning if you stack up 25 people in a sanctuary, it is supposed to heal everyone for roughly 200-300 hp / tick. In patch 4.2, this diminishing return suddenly vanished with no word. Assuming everyone is stacked up, that means you get 2-4k ticks on everyone in the raid, which adds up to a stupid amount of healing. This bug is the primary reason holypriests are still raiding 25mans though, as disc priests totally blow holy out of the water in situations where the sanctuary doesn't cover many people.

[Deleted]

As a Heal Lead of 25 man I can tell you that both are great in there own ways for differing roles. 10 man depends what is needed really.

[Cl0ver]

I recently dropped my disc spec to have holy and shadow.
My guild isn't focusing too hard on heroics, but I can do 10m reg FL just fine as holy.

Guardian spirit is great for Baleroc (lack of raid healing in that fight), and holy's sanctuary is sweet for Beth and Alys.

[Themos]

For non heroics, Holy is plenty viable overgearing or not. I'd argue on most of the FL fights on heroic mode work with Holy as well, but Barrier becomes a bigger concern if your raid doesn't have enough raid cooldowns.

[Zoldor]

It depends, 10v25 and your comp and the fight. The above post is nice, but plays disc up a lot. If you aren't progressing in Heroic content Holy is fine. I raid holy in 10man regular and have for years. I go disc for Baelroc because 150 stacks makes Bubble AWESOME, decimation blade a joke and you have nice mana regen.

If you are in 10 man and have a resto druid, stay Disc, as holy the only thing that is going to be great benefit is Guardian Spirit or extra AE for end of Ryo or Beth. If in 10 man you don't have a resto druid, I would go Holy for most fights and let the other two healers be your single target people. We run a pally and resto shaman. The Shaman is a pvp healer by nature for arena; so he is really comfortable with single target healing. This also allows your Resto shaman to conserve mana while single target healing so that when the big AE comes they can unload; chain heal and rain are pricy. I think disc is also viable in this situation, but you can really give your team more leeway with Holy and allowing the other two to be your single target healers. Barrier is amazing as well, but hardly mandatory for any fight in regular up to Domo that I've seen. No Rags experience yet. Disc in 10 man is the perfect partner to a resto druid in my opinion. Good shields to make incoming damage reduced so that HoTs can get stacked, or get some free ticks while damage is mitigated and you have serious single target power with Pennance, AA and Power Infusion.

In 25 man it depends really on the make up a lot more. 1 resto druid and 1 holy priest is a powerful AE team in 25. Disc if you need raid cooldowns, say you have a lot of shaman and all ya have is spirit link or druids and all you have is Tranq. A good barrier helps a lot when saving 25 folks. I would still let the pallies, if you have enough, do the single target healing with some sweet beacon overlap, and just back them up and raid heal as disc. Holy still brings the best tank CD, I think, in Guardian Spirit. So if you got raid cds covered or the fight doesn't need em, but a tank is going to get crushed it wouldn't hurt to have GS available.

It really is your group make up that can point the arrow towards disc or holy. Neither is weak and neither is god mode atm, they are fairly evenly pegged. Really look at your make up and look at the fights that cause you trouble. Is it AE damage that is unavoidable killed you? End of Beth/Ryo? or is it lack of a CD that is making shit hard? Is it your tank that is collapsing like a paper sack under a car tire? Healing isn't like DPS where you can go "yes, that is the spec to play look at this data." Healing is about adapting to your team, the fight, and filling in the missing role. Honestly roll a Disc/Holy and test it out is my best advice. If you are Disc Shadow, does shadow benefit your raid? ie are you taking 25 stacks on baelroc or are you top 3 dps? If not going Disc/Holy for a bit won't hurt anyone.